Nu har vi jo lige haft Morten Bruun´s glimrende tråd om Phytoplankton og så tænkte jeg, at en tråd om at lave sit eget foder til fiskene, ville være en fin opfølgning.
Jeg har fulgt Stevens tråde om fodring, specielt af Mandarin fisk og jeg har set at det virker. De er meget glade for det foder.
Så jeg spurgte Steven Parker der har lavet guiden, om jeg måtte lægge den ind på vores forum. Og det fik jeg lov til. Så både guiden og billeder er fra Steven Parker.
Steven Parker er nu med i vores FB gruppe for saltvandsforum, så hvis I har spørgsmål til det kan I helt sikkert fange ham der. Ellers skal jeg selvfølgelig nok være behjælpelig, hvis spørgsmål i gruppen skulle kikse.
Busy morning getting the outdoor Copepod cultures ready for the new season, 2 new containers and a 50/50 with new and old water to seed the new tubs. Still a tad on the early side but come late March hopefully these containers once again will be thriving with Copepods.........
Explanation on my Copepod cultures and what I have found to work for me as follows........
Large heavy duty plastic containers or buckets/ glass tank with large surface area and that are deep to counteract high temperatures.
Problem with small shallow containers and ones with small surface area is possible overheating!!
2 placement semi- sunny position, don't feel that the placement has to be in direct sun is better not to position in an area of direct sun so to avoid overheating and water becoming depleted of oxygen concentration levels.
3 Containers can be filled with either newly made up salt water or water from water changes.
My preference is water from water changes.
4 once filled mark desired level with marker pen as this will make it easier to see what evaporation levels you are getting and so you can simply top up accordingly with RO water to keep salinity stable ...
Desired level would be that of your Reef
5 I would recommend a small airline but not an airstone, just want a few bubbles per second to help maintain oxygen concentration levels.
6 feeding My preference is RG Complete Phytoplankton and your looking to keep the water a light cucumber green colour and as when you notice water is clearing use this as your guide to feed again.
The key thing is to keep the water a light green colour.
On first setting up and feeding only add enough Phytoplankton to get the light green cucumber tint but as when you see visible pod numbers are increasing more food will be required.
7 for anyone who can get hold of GHA (Green hair Algae this is brilliant for both Copepod cultures and Amphipod cultures as both will feed on the microscopic algae growth + the GHA will help with nutrient export and oxygenate the water and provide additional shading.
8 water changes 10% from total volume every 6/8 weeks but when doing so a 100 micron sieve will be required to collect any pods to put back into culture.
9 Always if possible setup multiple cultures so that no one culture is over harvested so depleting your culture of Adult breeding pods.
10... Harvesting, 100 micron sieve, simply using a jug scoop pods out and pour water through sieve collecting harvest.
11... End of season simply leave cultures be as they will go dormant for the Autumn winter months and here in the IIK where I am the cultures come back to life early to mid March. ........
Hope the above information helps those interested
- Billede af Steven Parkers kulturer.
- Billede af Steven Parkers kulturer
